Pressing Truths

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Serving ministers have pressing career reasons to support Government policies. They sometimes ­also have an acute temptation to wish the press to be muted. Nick Boles, the Planning Minister, is in that position. Yet he has disregarded self-interest in condemning the Government’s and Labour’s plans for parliamentary oversight of press regulation. Mr Boles appears to have done this for no more complicated reason than a belief in the ­necessity of a free press. In an age where the public has grown excessively cynical about politicians’ motivations, he provides a notable counter example of libertarian principle.